


Coming Out the Cupboard

by dancingwithwings



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: (pretty much equal amounts of both), Angst, Canon-Compliant, Fluff, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Just Karasuno bein' gay, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-14
Updated: 2016-10-14
Packaged: 2018-08-22 10:06:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8282026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancingwithwings/pseuds/dancingwithwings
Summary: "He finds out later that the angel’s name is Sugawara Koushi and he isn’t really an angel after all: he cracks scandalous jokes and grins like the devil himself, and loves shrimp onigiri more than anything else in the world.

  Daichi likes shrimp onigiri too, he decides, but not as much as he likes Sugawara Koushi."
 In which the infamous Karasuno storage cupboard helps to solve quite a few of Daichi's problems, Suga being one of them.





	

Daichi is straight.

He’s not especially opposed to dating boys, he tells himself, and he’s definitely not homophobic. He’s just never been inclined to see them that way. Sure, he can appreciate his teammates’ legs during training, and he can see the appeal of an Adam’s apple. He doesn’t really care if his friends get together, so long as it doesn’t affect the game, or he doesn’t accidentally walk in on them kissing in the locker rooms. (Because damn, two of his senpai making out after the junior inter-high finals match was something Daichi really did not need to see.)  


Boys can be aesthetically pleasing, he admits. But the concept of dating, especially a guy, doesn’t really occur to his mess of a middle-school brain, and to be honest, he’s happy muddling along without it. Dating a guy would be stressful. Dating a guy would be strange. 

(Why would you, he tries to convince himself, when girls have perfume and pretty hair, and tiny hands that fit so well in yours?)

Not that he’s had any experience with that either. At the tender age of thirteen and three-quarters, the stress of any sort of relationship would be too much for Daichi to handle. Middle-school Daichi, who piles his free time into volleyball training and studying for the entrance exams ever looming on the horizon: straight, middle-school Daichi, who keeps his eyes to himself in the locker rooms and his dreams set on the sky. Having a girlfriend would be nice, but he doesn’t have time for it, so the buttons on his blazer stay well and truly put. The local high school, and its legendary volleyball team beckon.

(That’s what he tells himself, anyway, though in reality maybe holding a girl’s hand doesn’t sound as nice as it’s supposed to.) 

He knows that not all girls are lip gloss and flowers, anyway, and if he’s honest with himself he prefers them that way. Girls like Michimiya Yui are awesome; girls with scraped-up knees from exploring the woods and teeth knocked out after walking into doors (they were wobbly, anyway, she assures him one night when she turns up at the door looking like some kind of teenage vampire). 

Girls who look as cool in dungarees as they do in kitten heels; girls who throw themselves into everything and cheer from the sidelines at his volleyball matches. Girls who make plastic cup walkie-talkies for top-secret, super-spy conversations. (The very same walkie-talkies that resulted in a broken arm as she and Daichi tried to string them between top-floor windows. Key word being tried. Michimiya hadn’t been able to play volleyball for months, but Daichi had been insanely jealous of her cast; he can remember her smile as he scrawled his name over it.) 

When Daichi was little, he thought he was going to marry Michimiya Yui. Now, as she turns up at his door with a full set of teeth and a new uniform for their first day at high school, he’s not so sure. Michimiya is a sister, and he listens absently as she chats on the way to school about their new timetables and _ooh, Daichi, do you reckon there’ll be any cute girls in your class? I could set you up with one of them if you want, I know you’re too shy to make a move anyway._

Her eyes are lit up with schemes and anticipation, and Daichi hasn’t the heart or the certainty to admit that girls, however cute or cool or bad at throwing plastic cups, maybe just aren’t his thing. So instead, he laughs and cuffs Michimiya on the shoulder, and thinks of the three years to come.

(He is straight, he _is_. He just hasn’t found the right girl yet.) 

*** 

There are a few cute girls in his class, he discovers, and Daichi is straight.

Or, at least, he tries to think he is, until he walks into the gym after his first day at Karasuno High and sees an angel standing at the back of the room, hair full of starlight and moonbeams and all.

And then suddenly, he’s not so sure any more.

(He finds out later that the angel’s name is Sugawara Koushi and he isn’t really an angel after all: he cracks scandalous jokes and grins like the devil himself, and loves shrimp onigiri more than anything else in the world.)

(Daichi likes shrimp onigiri too, he decides, but not as much as he likes Sugawara Koushi.)

***

Training is a lot harder in high school, Daichi soon finds out.

Not because of the early mornings, or the fact that everyone there is better than him at receiving and he’s not quite used to being the youngest again; not because of the lack of coaches, or the merciless third-years that commandeer the court like it’s a battlefield. 

Not because of any of the things that the other first year, Asahi, complains about: how hard it is to balance homework and practice, and how if the second years’ serves get any more powerful his arms are going to drop off. (Asahi soon becomes a fast friend, but by the way he constantly trembles, you’d think the world was just about to end.)

Not because of any of these things, no.

It’s because he’s so close to Sugawara Koushi.

Sugawara (or Suga, as Daichi learns he likes to be called), is an angel and a devil all at once. 

He’s taller than Daichi, just by a little (but just enough to tease him about it), and he walks like he’s on top of the world, tossing a volleyball to himself with an ever-present Cheshire-cat grin.

His hair is the strangest shade of ivory Daichi’s ever seen: the colour of rocks he discovers in the woods with Yui, the ones that she thought were moondust and he vowed were meteorites. 

He has freckles on his cheeks that Daichi wants to make into constellations with marker pens, and his laugh holds the ability to send his heart skipping like the stones they skim on the river after practice, when storm clouds don’t chase them and convenience stores close early.

Suga finds beauty in everything. He laughs like a drain when he blows steam in cool air; he says it’s dragon breath, though Daichi argues it's more like the puffing of a tiny silver train. 

Daichi doesn’t know how Suga does it, so he comes to the only logical conclusion: Suga may not be an angel, and he may not be a devil. But he’s definitely not human, either. 

He’s perfect. Not always at volleyball - he messes up his sets from time to time – or at schoolwork – math seems to stump him as much as it does Daichi – but he’s perfect nonetheless, in that new-person sort of way which evades words to describe it. Daichi finds himself floundering at the dinner table when his mom asks him about his new school and new team and new friends, because his thoughts are immediately filled with moonbeam hair and ringing laughter, gingerbread coffee and salonpas spray. He doesn’t really know how to describe Suga other than these things, apart from the irresistible urge to call him by his first name (Suga calls him by his) or hold his hand, and the slightly ominous notion that he's never felt like this about any girl before.

He tries to deny it.  
But he knows he’s falling, when, as he cleans the gymnasium after practice or sprints (late, as always) to school with Yui, he finds himself thinking of this angel boy.

***

At first, he refuses to acknowledge the fact that Suga’s always on his mind, just as he’s always by his side through the most strenuous of practices. The angel boy is a permanent fixture; cracking jokes, stealing his food and vowing to run farther than him in the warmup, as if Daichi’s going to let him win just like that, as if he doesn’t know that they’ll just keep on running, determined to beat each other until they crumple wheezing to the ground and are yelled at by the third years for wasting time.

(Currently, Daichi’s winning, three to two, and he doesn’t think it’s a waste of time at all.)

He refuses to acknowledge it because he’s not gay. He’s not. But skimming-stone heartbeats and starlight smiles are leading him to believe that maybe, just maybe, he’s not quite straight, either.

Eventually, Daichi supposes this is a crush.

He has no idea what to do about it.

So he settles for tearing his eyes from Suga’s face whenever he catches himself staring, beating down the bubble in his chest whenever he sets to him at practice, bundling his daydreams into boxes and wrestling his subconscious into submission. And nobody notices, Daichi thinks to himself as he listens to Suga and Asahi argue over pork buns on the way home. He’s pretty good at hiding this, he thinks. Maybe having a crush on his new best friend isn’t such a disaster after all. 

Daichi holds his head up high, and walks beside this angel boy like he hasn’t a care in the world.

***

Daichi is halfway through first year when he realises that he’s not as inconspicuous as he thinks he is.

He’s over at Suga’s house with Asahi, studying for a chemistry test that’s looming ominously on the horizon. His parents are threatening to restrict his time spent at volleyball if he doesn’t scrape at least a passing grade, and while normally he’d be fine, chemistry has never been his best subject, and it doesn’t help that he’s spent the last few lessons dreaming about a certain angel’s smile.

(The very same angel who is chewing a pencil across the table, smile missing in action as he tries to decipher an equation that both Asahi and Daichi had given up on long ago.) 

Titrations exist only to antagonise him, Daichi decides, gazing at the mess of formulae on the paper in front of him and trying to ignore the temptation of bashing his head off the desk. 

_Much like Suga does,_ the little voice in his head adds, and he growls at either the voice or the textbook. He’s not entirely sure which.

Asahi, a saint, ignores this occurrence and stretches out on the paper-strewn table. 

“Hey, Suga, could you get me some water?”

The silver head is raised from the worksheet, Suga's face splitting into a small grin (not quite the one responsible for Daichi’s current crisis, but close enough).

“Sure.” He grabs a glass from the sideboard and heads into the kitchen. “I’ll get you one too, Daichi.”

At the sound of his name, Daichi lifts his head from the desk and smiles. Instead of Suga’s hazel eyes, however, he’s faced with Asahi’s questioning gaze. And by the smirk slowly spreading across the other first year’s lips, Daichi knows what’s coming next.

“So, Daichi… anything you want to tell me about?”

Daichi knows exactly what he’s insinuating, and normally he would treat his teasing, well-meaning friend to a smack round the head, or at least an assertion of his heterosexuality. But today, somehow, he doesn’t have the energy, and he just groans. 

(And then he blushes, which is even worse). 

Asahi starts to guffaw, and Daichi’s reaching for his shirt collar to show him what for, when he manages to overbalance the chair and ends up bashing his head off the desk and crashing to the ground, dignity and chemistry notes in shreds around him.

(When Suga re-enters the room with two glasses of water, he doesn’t quite understand why Daichi’s massaging his forehead and yelling, or why Asahi appears to be falling out of his chair from laughing too hard.)

***

Asahi catches up to him in the corridor the next day and pulls him aside. He’s a little fidgety (though that’s nothing new), and Daichi worries for a second that he’s going to tell him that something’s wrong when the taller first year blurts out –

“Um, it’s, uh, fine. Y’know.”

Daichi raises an eyebrow and Asahi practically cringes, flushing so violently Daichi’s scared he’s going to pass out.  
“Having a crush. You know. On a guy.”

Oh, great. They’re having this talk. On the way to calculus, as well. What a morning.

Daichi smiles awkwardly and turns to leave, but Asahi’s not done.

“And I, uh, don’t think the team will care either. Because… um…”  
He leans closer, as if about to divulge the world’s biggest secret in the gap between classrooms 4 and 4a.

“They locked Ikeda and Saito in the equipment cupboard the other day. Together. And they wouldn’t let them out, until…”

The penny doesn’t drop, and he’s looking at Asahi in confusion when suddenly it all makes sense. His mouth falls open in a disbelieving ‘O’. The bell rings and Asahi scoots off, looking mortified, and then Daichi has to run to calculus to avoid being put in detention and missing practice later on.

 _Ikeda and Saito aren’t straight either,_ he thinks as he sinks into his seat. _I’m not the only one._

_Maybe it will all be fine._

(And if Daichi spends the entirety of calculus daydreaming about what would happen if he and Suga were locked in a cupboard together, well, Asahi doesn’t need to know.)

***

First year flows by in a mess of practice and study nights, so quickly that Daichi doesn’t even notice. Suddenly, the finals are creeping up on him; the Third Years are getting stressed, because it’s their last chance to bring the team to Nationals, and they take it out on the team. Training gets harder, quicker, and the first years tumble into bed each night with bruised arms and aching legs from receiving, spiking, serving again and again. 

The only warning Daichi gets before he’s greeted with a new coach is a hurried conversation in the locker rooms; Ikeda warns him to keep his mouth shut and only speak when spoken to, because things are going to get serious now, and Coach Ukai doesn’t take kindly to slackers. 

Then he enters the gymnasium and is whisked away into a world of pain, and suddenly volleyball doesn’t seem so fun anymore.

Coach Ukai is ruthless. 

The training brings his body to the brink time and time again, but he bites his tongue and bears it, because his teammates keep assuring him that he’s incredibly lucky to have such a coach, and he has to live up to Karasuno’s powerhouse reputation. Ukai gives no bad advice. Then again, Ukai looks like a samurai, with the eyebrows to match; good or bad, Daichi’s not going to contradict anything he says.

It’s never easy. But Daichi turns up to practice with his eyes trained to the ground and the determination to survive, and a mouth full of sarcastic comebacks which he bites away every time somebody snaps. 

(Which is often. Daichi made a vow earlier on in the year to keep his eyes to himself in the changing rooms, but it’s kind of hard when your teammates are vomiting in the dustbins.)

He supposes it’s not all Ukai’s fault. Karasuno seems to have fallen into a losing streak they can’t get out of, and it’s impacting on the whole team’s morale. Living up to the reputation of a powerhouse school was never going to be easy, but Daichi never expected he’d have to bear most of the weight. Or that it would be so personal. 

Throughout the stress of finals and the gruelling practices, Daichi tries his best to offer a smile and a shoulder to lean on. Even so, it’s hard to pretend that the taunts of ‘fallen powerhouse’ and ‘flightless crows’ don’t get to him. He takes to practising later into the night, even after the third years leave, coaxing Suga into setting for him until dark falls and the coach forces them home.

Suga takes the criticism hard. His starlight grin dissolves along with his promised starter position, replaced by clenched hands on the bench and a voice that trembles when it cheers. His eyes won’t meet Daichi’s, and his laugh goes missing in action. It’s like the angel boy has been shut in a box, and in attempting to reach him, Daichi feels like he’s banging on a locked door.

Daichi doesn’t know how to cheer him up, aside from challenging him to a race or buying him pork buns. Casual smiles are replaced by frown lines. Gingerbread coffees go cold. 

The other boy is always distracted, so happy spells don’t last long. It happens during the day, as well as during practice – Suga’s eyes become distant, like he’s somewhere else entirely – which lets Daichi know that maybe it’s not just the new coach or the strict training regime. Suga’s keeping things from them. And no number of worried glances at Asahi or stupid doodles passed in class can make it better. 

One evening, Suga doesn’t wait for him after practice, so they don’t skip stones on the river that night. Or the night after, or the one after that.

Daichi feels like punching whatever’s making Suga feel this way (a whole lot of things, he decides, but he can’t punch them all, least of all Coach Ukai, so maybe a wall will have to do.) Because dammit, angels don’t deserve to choke back tears when the serve they’ve practised nights on end is criticised, and angels don’t refuse friend's offers to patch up scraped knees after practice. 

But Suga never mentions it, and Daichi never complains. Because gradually the team picks up again, and they’re so close to the nationals, and there’s only Shiratorizawa to go before the third years’ dreams come true; and then maybe the light will come back into Suga’s eyes and they’ll walk home chasing storm clouds once again.

(They lose.)

(And Coach Ukai yells.)

(And then the third years graduate in a mess of tears and mortarboards, and Daichi gets his exam results and finds out that he’s in the same class as Suga next year, and new students flood the corridors. It’s just like last year, Daichi finds out; walking into the gymnasium and seeing an array of new faces, except these ones are smaller than him - wow, that libero’s short - and he prays a silent prayer that they all know how to keep quiet, because Ukai doesn’t like people who are loud, and then he finds out that they don’t.)

So yes, it’s just like last year.

But nothing seems to be the same.

***

Without nationals and finals snapping at their heels, in second year, Daichi and Suga begin to recover. 

Coach Ukai eases off a bit, focusing on assessing the new recruits and putting them in positions, trying out different combo moves, and suddenly he doesn’t seem so harsh any more. Daichi has kouhai now, people who will look up to him, whether or not he mucks up his receives or misses a spike. And Suga walks into practice without a burden on his shoulders, which makes Daichi smile. He’s not sure what has happened to bring about this change, but he’s glad for it all the same; Suga’s started to accompany them home again, and he buys the first-years pork buns almost every night; he’s affectionately known (by Tanaka and Noya at least) as ‘Team Mom’ from then on. 

Starlit smiles return to the angel face. It makes Daichi’s heart sing a little, and Asahi teases him for being so smitten. Daichi practises his glaring face in the mirror. Apparently, it’s the only way to shut that dumbass up.

(It’s the only thing that Asahi dares tease him about, anyway. Despite his imposing presence on the court, he has never been much of a fighter. He’s sprouted long legs and the beginnings of a beard, but Daichi’s convinced that behind the broad shoulders hides a puppy, or maybe a tiny little kitten, because Asahi jumps at everything, and damn, this kid’s going to die of heart failure before he’s twenty.)

Suga is the _only_ thing Asahi teases him about, and Daichi hates it.

And then Asahi starts to look at the first-year libero in a different way, and Daichi learns that teasing him back is an _incredibly_ enjoyable pastime. 

***

A few months later, Daichi finds out that Suga’s gay, too.

They’re watching the first years do suicides, guzzling water by the legendary Ikeda-Saito cupboard. Asahi’s telling Suga about his English teacher, and how he managed to terrify some kid into reciting the entire alphabet backwards. Daichi isn’t really listening, instead focusing on the way that Suga’s laugh could make flowers grow.

(He’s not sure if he’s been reading too much manga recently, or if it’s the homosexual vibe emanating from the closet behind them. Whatever it is, as he watches his kouhai run, an incredible idea pops into his head.)

“Don’t you think Tanaka and Ennoshita would be a cute couple?” he remarks conversationally.

(Both Asahi and Suga do magnificent spit-takes. Ugh. Remind him to get some paper towels later.)

After making a hurried recovery and wiping down his front, Asahi nods. “Yeah. They are kind of cute together.” 

They watch as Tanaka whips his shirt off to celebrate fifty suicide runs and Ennoshita yells at him to put it back on, looking away to hide a badly concealed blush. Asahi grins. “We should lock them in the cupboard. Might help them get somewhere.”

Suga explodes in coughs again as Daichi snickers, this time taking a full minute to straighten back up. He glances at them nervously. 

“You guys aren’t… bothered? By that kind of thing?”

Daichi shakes his head. He’s long past denying his sexuality. Maybe he hasn’t come to terms with it out loud yet, but internally, he’s all good. “Nope. Not one bit.”

“Good.” Suga turns to face the court again, and takes a deep breath, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Because I’m gay, too.”

(It’s now or never, Daichi decides.)

“Same here.”

Suga stares.

“Make that three,” Asahi adds, and Suga’s face is turning from shocked to the biggest grin Daichi’s ever seen, when Nishinoya Yuu, Asahi’s tiny libero with way too much energy to spare, abandons his suicide runs to jump into their conversation with jazz hands and an ecstatic “Me four!”

They stare at him collectively, and he pauses to think a second.

“… well, bisexual, actually, but same difference.”

Then it’s Asahi’s turn to look flustered, and laughter rings through the gym as Suga clamours for a camera to capture his expression. The first years cluster around them in confusion, and as Suga laughs, Daichi finally feels like the angel boy is maybe not extraterrestrial. Maybe he’s just human. But whichever planet he’s been on these past few months, he’s finally coming home.

***

Second year drags on, and Suga comes back to life.

Daichi revels in it. He doesn’t know what made his friend retreat so much in the first place, but he suspects it had something to do with sexuality; after the impromptu mass coming-out in the middle of practice, Suga’s eyes have become brighter. He walks with a spring in his step again, and he doesn’t hesitate to sling an arm round Daichi’s shoulders or stay late to practise serving. Spring comes around with all its stressy, exam-filled glory, but this time Suga keeps shining; even as the preliminaries draw near and training picks up in pace, his smile never wavers. All the first years call him ‘mom’. 

(Daichi hits Asahi for calling him ‘dad’.) 

He knows that something’s still not quite right, though, and he doesn’t think it’s anything he can fix. It’s in the air when he goes to Suga’s house to study; it’s in the disapproving glances of his parents, and in the way the bedroom door remains open and ominous whenever they retreat there to plan game tactics and chat. 

On one such occasion, when they’ve both given up on their chemistry homework, Suga goes to fetch a glass of water and Daichi hears a dispute downstairs. He creeps to the hallway and peers over the banister.

 _Geez, mom,_ Suga appears to be yelling; _we’re not going to be doing anything. Just let us have the door closed, for God’s sake._

Daichi doesn’t catch his mother’s reply, but he sure as hell hears the door slam. He doesn’t say anything about it, however, especially when Suga returns and buries his head in a book for the rest of the evening. 

But other than that, life returns to how it was before the finals. Suga bullies Asahi into asking Nishinoya out, and the libero says yes; they make a comic pair, a gnome and a giant, two crows of a feather. Coach Ukai doesn’t mention it as they hold hands at the side of the court, and Tanaka is twice as generous with high-fives as usual, congratulating Noya on ‘finally getting some action’. 

If anything, this makes Suga relax even more, though the same couldn’t be said for Asahi – it seems he never goes anywhere without a blush adorning his cheeks and the energetic first-year hanging on to his hand.

(Daichi walks in on them making out in the cupboard one day and stumbles around trying to claw his eyes out for an hour afterwards. Suga laughs ‘til he wheezes as Asahi chases Daichi round the court, face bright red; Nishinoya strolls out the cupboard looking very pleased with himself, which only makes Suga laugh harder.

 _“I’msorryI’msorryohmygodI’msosorryyoureallydidn’tneedtoseethatpleasedon’ttellTanaka,”_ Asahi pleads.

“Pass me the bleach,” Daichi replies.) 

So it’s mostly just Suga and him from then on, although Asahi does join them when his eardrums need a break or Noya’s off pranking the vice-principal or something equally stupid.

When the finals come up again, after many a night of breakdowns over osmosis and diffusion (because seriously, whose idea was biology), they pass by without incident. It’s a year since Suga had drifted away, and somehow, the angel boy is back by Daichi’s side. In his full glory, too. Daichi can't remember the last time Suga had failed to get the team in stitches, or hadn't punctuated practise with suggestive stares when Asahi and Noya walk by.

He reflects on this as he walks to school with Michimiya. She laughs at the vacant look in his eyes, teases him for having a crush. 

“Who’s the lucky lady?” she smirks, and Daichi’s reminded that she doesn’t know. About him being gay. Or anyone being gay. Or Suga.

(Why is it always Suga?)

Today is not the day to spoil her fun, he decides, and he cuffs her on the shoulder, which only makes her tease him more.

***

They lose at preliminaries again, only this time, it might be worse than last year.

The third years leave the team to focus on studying; apparently, none of them want a career in volleyball, so they abandon their legacy in a mess of confused players, complete with a fuming coach. Training picks up to the point where Daichi’s body is as strained as it was at the peak of last year’s disaster. 

This time, Suga’s stoic grin remains unwaveringly in place, but even a starlight smile doesn’t help much when three first years give up under the pressure. By the time Ennoshita, Kinoshita and Narita see the error of their ways and come back to the club, it’s too late; Coach Ukai had succumbed to the pressure, and retired for good.

(Suga, Asahi and Daichi visit him in hospital with flowers and apologies. He smiles before he can stop himself, shooing them out of the room with growls of ‘You should be practising’ and ‘where the hell is that sorry libero of yours? Asahi, you need to get on his case.’)

Their team is a ragtag bunch, but the three second years try their best. Hopeless: whatever chance they may have had was stitched together out of desperation and one too many late nights before the match. Suga was setter, and Asahi, with his newly bestowed title of ‘Ace’, was trembling in his boots. 

Their first opponent?  
Date Tech.

 _Well,_ Daichi thinks bitterly as he leaves the court, _they don’t call it the iron wall for nothing._

They break up for the holidays on a bittersweet note. Daichi aces his finals, and will still be in the same class as Suga next year. Asahi will be in the one below. Schoolwise, things are looking up. 

And Suga’s still by his side, which is a huge improvement from last year, Daichi tells himself.

But when Asahi and Noya break a broom and their relationship over the loss, and neither come back to the club, Daichi wonders if it really is.

***

Third year arrives with a bang, as he walks into practice to find two strangers screaming at each other. 

Well, not total strangers; Kitagawa Daiichi’s genius setter is known all over Miyagi, and the ginger-headed kid he’s locked in combat with was never going to be a face to forget. Daichi remembers cheering with Tanaka and Suga as the underclassmen battled for the preliminary crown, jaw dropping in awe at Kageyama’s incredible sets and the way the ginger kid – Hinata, was it? – sprung from the ground like a man twice his height. He hadn’t even held a hope of having them on his team. Karasuno was the fallen powerhouse. Surely Seijoh or the dreaded Shiratorizawa would be better suited for their talents.

Kageyama calls Hinata a dumbass and grabs a handful of carrot-coloured hair, and Daichi sighs. _Apparently not._

He waits a second more before wading into the fray. 

As he pulls the two new first-years apart and looks up to find Suga entering the gym, a smile splits his face. Maybe this year won’t be so bad. Maybe, with these two fledglings, they’ll finally make it to nationals. Who knows? Maybe this time, they’ll finally start to win.

(Later on, as Daichi apologises profusely to the vice-principal and kicks the first-years out of the gym, he sighs. 

_This is going to be a long, long year._ )

***

It’s not, really. None of his years have been. As Tsukishima and Yamaguchi, then Hinata and Kageyama, then Nishinoya, and finally, finally Asahi rejoin the team, the months pass by in a black-and-orange blur. The team comes together like clockwork, like magic, and suddenly they’re travelling to Tokyo and challenging powerhouses and beating Aoba Johsai in their own gymnasium; impossible plays become possible and Daichi’s in the midst of it all, captaining this murder of crows who are somehow learning to fly. 

Daichi stares the preliminaries straight in the face. And he smiles.

(He finally understands the desperation of his first year senpai. It’s his final year at Karasuno High School, and so help him, he’s taking this mess of a team to nationals if it’s the last damn thing he does.)

But if he’s really honest, it’s not their losses and wins that he’ll remember from his time at Karasuno. It’s not the study nights crammed full of last-minute revision. It’s not even the copious amount of caffeine required to stay alive at 5am, or the standardized tests that terrorized him into weekly total meltdowns. None of that really matters to third-year Daichi, who is standing on the doorstep of nationals and university and adult life, all at once.

Instead, what really matters is Suga.

(Isn’t it always?)

His years at high school have gone quickly, but other than the period during first year where everything went to hell, he can’t remember a time where the angel boy has not been by his side. Suga is a constant. Suga is a lifeline. And although he may not be a starting player, he’s the vice-captain of the team that they’ve reared from the ground (a team of oddballs, of misfits, of people who make him tear his hair out but fill his heart with pride), and Daichi doesn’t know what he’d do without him.

He’s not sure when he fell in love.

The romantic in him would probably say that it was the very first time they met, when they were first years and Daichi walked into the gymnasium (and then into the volleyball net, which Suga has never let him live down).

But really, he thinks, it took a while. Maybe it took him three years. 

In those three years, however quickly they’ve escaped him, they’ve been through a hell of a lot; two new coaches, drifting apart and coming together again, coming out to each other and the world. Sweat, tears, and bruised knuckles from punching the wall. (Thankfully, the new Coach Ukai inspires a lot less wall-punching than the old one did.) 

But they’re still friends. And Daichi doesn’t know what this stupid crush (that feels like a little bit more) could do to that, so he keeps quiet and lets his heart swell to burst.

(And no, he doesn’t miss the way that Suga looks at him, like he just might feel the same way. He knows that Suga leaning into him and catching his hand while they walk means more than just friendship, but he can’t bring himself to act on it, because they’ve come so far and he can’t just throw it all away.)

He still holds out hope, though, which is not always a good thing. Michimiya Yui’s confession comes when he least expects it, and the sad smile she gives him when she walks away rips a little hole in his heart.

It hurts. 

But it wouldn’t be fair to accept it, he tells himself, and he’s right. It wouldn’t be. Not with Suga consuming all his thoughts, nor the stupid beautiful starlit smile that’s always on his mind.  
(A week or so later, Daichi sits her down and pours everything out. Everything: his sexuality, Suga, his plans for the future, an apology; they’re both crying by the end of it, but a burden he didn’t know he carried leaves his shoulders. They haven’t talked like this in years, and it’s worth it to see a smile fighting onto her face)

It turns out they’ve both applied to the same university, the same course in sport science.  
Suga’s going there too, for nursing, and they can be three, Daichi hopes. He knows he can’t be sure.  
Only finals can dictate their future now.

Sometimes, Daichi had wondered if Suga was worth all the stress. So many nights he’d lain awake, wondering if Suga would ever do the same for him, wondering if practise would improve the next day. Wondering if things would ever get better.

As he watches this angel boy yelling at his kouhai and ruffling their hair, cheering for them when they fly and supporting them when they fall, practising serves and defending his teammates fiercely (terrorising the hell out of Seijoh’s first years as he does so), Daichi knows that it’s been worth it. 

One evening, however, as Hinata and Kageyama chase each other round the court and Suga stands by his side, laughing that damnable laugh that makes Daichi feel like kissing him senseless, it dawns on him what little time he has left.

***

Apparently, Asahi has the same thought. Or, at least someone did.

Daichi’s never trusting Nishinoya ever, ever again.

They’d convinced him to go look for a broom in the cupboard. He hadn’t missed the whispered discussion between them several minutes beforehand, or the mischievous grin that had lit up the libero’s face. And goddammit, Daichi is by no means as perceptive as Suga, but he knows by now that when Noya smiles like that, it is _never_ a good thing.

But still, he goes into that cupboard. The _Ikeda-Saito cupboard,_ of all cupboards. And he realises too late what could be going on here, and he hopes like hell he isn’t right, but he knows Tanaka and Noya are watching him and he can’t _not_ go into the cupboard. He’d never hear the end of it otherwise.

So Daichi enters the cupboard, holding onto the slim, slim hope that maybe they’re not pulling a prank.  
Maybe he can still be saved.  
Maybe Hinata’s thrown up again and they do just really need a broom...

He sees Suga by the volleyballs and hears the door slam, and knows all hope is lost.

The setter’s eyes grow wide, and Daichi feels his face become a beetroot, and as if that’s not a good enough giveaway, he trips over his feet as he turns back to the door.

 _Goddammit,_ he thinks. _They’ve got me._

And Daichi fucking _howls_. 

“Let me out or so help me I’ll have you running laps until you _fucking drop_ –“ he shrieks, knowing all too well what’s going on here, battering his fists desperately on the door and hoping beyond hope that somebody, _somebody_ will have mercy…

Daichi recognises Asahi’s footsteps, and holds his breath as his fellow third-year knocks on the door.  


_Please,_ he prays silently. _I’ll do anything. I’ll buy pork buns for the rest of eternity. I’ll turn up to practice in a frilly dress and slippers. Anything. Just get me out of this god damn cupboard, and let me live in gay denial for the rest of my cowardly, captainly days._

Asahi is silent for a second, and Daichi thinks his saviour has come.

Until he hears Asahi’s voice.

“Have fun, captain.”

And then he turns around and sees Suga’s face just a few centimetres from his, and his heart just about fucking _stops_ ; and then it’s hammering, it’s hammering so damn fast and he can’t stop his eyes from drifting down to those lips, slightly parted, smirking in that particular way that lets Daichi know that there is absolutely _no way_ he’s leaving here alive.

And as Suga steps closer, Daichi’s eyes flutter shut and he wonders how anyone could ever call this boy an angel.

***

After the cupboard incident, nothing really changes.

The entire team runs laps of the school for more practices than he can count. Daichi doesn’t care that the preliminaries are coming up. Watching Asahi and the second years suffer is just as good as going to nationals, he decides.

(They still end up going to nationals, though, and even almost winning.)

They’re still the team mom and dad; if anything, more so than ever. They buy pork buns for everyone and walk home, laughing, with Asahi. They study together in Daichi’s room, chewing chunks from pencils and groaning over the sheer impossibility of advanced math. Except now, Daichi allows his eyes to roam Suga’s face, and Suga’s eyes meet his with a smile (and sometimes even a kiss, if he’s extra, extra lucky.) 

They meet up for gingerbread coffees and walks in the park, and Asahi catches them making out in the cupboard, more than just once.  
It’s fair to say he gets a very bitter taste of his own medicine.

But no, not much has changed. Sugawara’s eyes shine like the sun, and when he and Daichi finally graduate and get an apartment of their own in Tokyo, he fills the place with creeper plants and birdseed to feed the crows ever-present on the windowsill. He eats them both out of house and home, prompting midnight visits to the convenience store, where he spends the journey gazing at the moon and mapping out the stars. He connects his freckles with a marker pen, and chases his own breath in winter, and scrapes up his knees carrying boxes up the stairs. 

(... And sometimes doing other things, too.) 

Suga cheers louder than anyone from the stands as Karasuno High School reaches nationals, and laughs that damnable laugh as Daichi cries tears of joy when they finally, finally win. He knocks Ennoshita off his feet in a bear hug the moment they see him, the captain who finally managed to do it, and they ask him if he got together with Tanaka in the end. He doesn’t reply, but the blush invading his cheeks is an answer enough for the two of them.

Daichi recommends a cupboard, if he runs out of ideas. 

Sugawara Koushi is still definitely not an angel. He still cracks jokes and grins like the devil himself. And, as Daichi comes through to the sitting room to order takeout, he’s reminded that Suga loves shrimp onigiri more than anything else in the world.

(He kisses him.)

… well, except for maybe Daichi.

**Author's Note:**

> And that's all, folks!  
> (This was not meant. to be. so loNG)
> 
> Thanks for sticking through that mess! I really enjoyed writing this one. I feel like Daichi isn't appreciated enough in general; he puts up with so much on a daily basis, he deserves some kind of reward.  
> (... well, he has Suga, I guess, so maybe that's enough.)
> 
> Anyway, the idea of Suga being some kind of angel has always made me laugh, because have you seen this kid? I am 100% sure that under all the 'starlit smiles' and everything else, he is actually Satan incarnate. And boy, does Daichi know it ;)  
> Edit: having just watched the new episode (s3 ep2) I feel my point is well and truly proven.
> 
> Many thanks to my friend Kev, for beta'ing this for me! I was literally squealing while reading their comments, it was great. Though I'm not sure whether I should refer to them as 'pork bun' or not...?
> 
> I also have a fan Instagram (self promotion lol) - @the.satan.setter  
> Please leave a comment, it would make my day ^-^  
> \- Ish
> 
> Also, you know you're a writer when you look up the difference between meteor and meteorite and have a mild aneurysm because _meteorite does not fit with the flow of the sentence_


End file.
